Stunt: Hollywood Bad Boy Romance Read online

  “Make-up,” I snip as I retrieve my shoes and clipboard.

  “Anytime,” he smirks.

  “No I mean get yourself to – argh.”

  He knows what I mean. He's playing with me. Like I'm offering to make up from our fight. Not that there's anything to make up from because we aren’t a thing.

  I storm across the gym and through the door wondering what the hell is wrong with me that one man gets me so flustered and disorientated.

  ChapterTEN

  I'm standing breathless in the dark, watching Knox and Emily Jayne shooting a scene on the Manhattan set where Truan kissed me. The memory of his lips pressing, his tongue delving and curling around mine, produces swirls of desire rising into my chest.

  “Have you ever been to New York,” a voice at my shoulder asks.

  I have no idea how long he's been standing there. I was lost in the moment. Lost in him.

  “No. I've never been anywhere,” I murmur. Feeling his presence merge into my skin. “Except here. And I haven’t seen much of that.”

  “Where would you love to visit?”

  I wonder why he's taking such an interest in my personal dreams when he belittled my one big one of becoming a movie actress.

  “Paris, of course. And Egypt because of that old Cleopatra movie with Liz Taylor. And a beach in Tahiti. The usual.”

  He takes my hand and leads me in a way I can't pull back from. His arm a powerful leash on me such that I don't even want to tear myself away. I allow my body to be led by him, loving the sensation.

  “Where are you taking me?” I demand. But still not pulling away.

  “For coffee, or course.”

  Oh.

  We leave the crew in the darkness, leave the New York set built inside a warehouse, cross the lot and enter another.

  “I thought we were going to Craft Service,” I say.

  Truan doesn't respond, only pushes open a small door cut into the side of a massive hangar. He leads me through and closes the door behind us so we're left in total blackness. I shiver with nervous anticipation but my eyes refocus to the gloom enough to see that the huge space is empty, waiting for a set to complete it.

  Truan strides across the expansive area, to a structure covered with thick electrical wires and switch boxes. I have no idea what he's doing but I feel trepidation rising.

  He throws a couple of switches on the board and one large lever. Nothing magical occurs. We're still standing in the dark and echoing empty building.

  Now he leads me along the wall of carpentry sectioning an area of the warehouse until we reach a board with a handle. A door cut out of the wooden wall. He pulls me close, so I'm standing in front of him, facing through the entrance, him directly behind. I'm acutely aware of his avid bulge close to my ass cheeks. His hands rest on both my hips gently and as he leans forward to press down on the door handle, his hot breath on the side of my neck sends a rash of goosebumps freckling down my arms and thighs.

  I shut my eyes for a second to compose myself. I can't let him see how he overwhelms me. The hinges squeak and grind. He pushes on my hips lightly to press me ahead. Then I open my eyes as I step through the door into…

  Paris.

  I gasp and my face lights up because I feel it glowing from within. My entire life Paris has seemed like the epitome of romantic places. My mom wanted to go there for her honeymoon but she was already pregnant with me by the time she was led to the altar and never got to fulfill her dream.

  It's only painted boxes but it looks so real. And behind the slate roofs I see the top of the Eiffel Tower. Truan takes my hand and leads me down the empty street.

  “I'm in Paris,” I breathe, looking all around me because; “It seems so real.”

  “Yeah, it's hard to tell the difference between fake and real these days,” Truan says.

  “You still don't think much of movies, your profession.”

  “I like it well enough. Not what it does to some people. And I fell into it as a job. It wasn't like my big dream.”

  I notice he's thumbing the top of my hand as we walk, the slow exploration produces a shiver up my arm. We come to a storefront that has a small round table and two bentwood chairs on the sidewalk. The only one 'open' even though there's not a soul in the streets.

  “Let's have that coffee.” Truan pulls out one of the seats and I laugh as I sit and he pushes me in.

  I'm happy to go along with the role play. He clicks his fingers through the window of the cafe.

  “This is definitely my dream,” I say. Then I leap in my seat when a man appears at my shoulder.

  “Cafe au lait?” he says, in a real French accent. He's wearing the full waiter uniform, down to the long spotless white apron tied around his slim hips.

  “Good evening, Francois,” Truan says as the waiter sets down a large cup topped with whipped cream and grated chocolate sprinkles.

  “Good evening, Sir,” the Frenchie responds, keeping in character.

  “How did you -?” I ask, giggling as the 'waiter' makes a minute bow and disappears back into the cafe. Meaning he goes through the door and into the black expanse behind the set we recently emerged from.

  “Don't ask how the magic is created. Just surrender and enjoy it,” Truan tells me with eyes that delve into my core, making my clit pinch between my crossed thighs.

  I guess Paris is a pretty typical dream destination. I should have said Antarctica but I don't like cold. He must have hired one of the extras to play Francois and wait with the coffee until we showed up. Quite the effort for a date he couldn’t even be sure would actually happen.

  “I can't believe you did all this – for me – for coffee.”

  “I had to start somewhere,” Truan says, so sincerely I find it hard to continue to doubt him. “Some guys get her at 'hallo', I'm hoping to win her with a romantic coffee in Paris.”

  Romantic!

  “This is amazing,” I stutter, all kinds of sensations fountaining through my core.

  He covers my hands, piled on each other on the table, with his huge one.

  “This? Or that?” He leans his head to indicate the fake city surrounding us.

  “Both,” I say. I slide one hand out from under his and rest it on top, so he's clasped between my two palms. “No one's ever done anything like this for me. It's like a dream.”

  “So what is your dream? Did you come out here to be a star PA?”

  “No, I came to be the star. Like all the others. Corny huh?”

  “Nothing amazing would ever happen if people didn't dream.”

  He says the most amazing things sometimes. Things that make my heart lift and sing with possibility. Plus his powerful hand in my small ones is doing strange things, like little buds of excitement opening in my chest.

  “But every girl thinks she's special until she arrives in Hollywood.”

  “Some are special. You're one of them.” He leans in across the table, just a little, as though pulled to me magnetically, his eyes focused on my mouth as I talk.

  “I'm just a girl with a crazy dream of being on the big screen. Maybe I need to prove something to everyone back home. I mean why does anyone really want -”

  I realize I've been reciprocating, drawn toward his lips so that now the undersides of my breasts are squashed onto the table, shelved atop his hand. The heat from the tips of his hard fingers makes the points light up with eagerness.

  Truan's free hand cups the back of my head to pull me onto his mouth. Our lips crash together and he pulls me in with his tongue, swirling and tugging. Our hands on the table lift and palm flat. His fingers intertwine into mine and clamp, tugging me to him. His two hands trap me in his hold, pinioned on his mouth as his tongue delves into me, demanding more.

  I let out a moan on his lips that sets off a frenzy. Without breaking the kiss he stands to cup my head in both hands, giving me more of his tongue, caressing deeper with his probing. He scrapes his palm down my neck, across my breast, setting off sparks through my c
hest, before lifting me from the seat. I feel weightless as I glide through the air and land in his lap. He settles back into his cafe chair with me curled up on his thick hard thighs, never once losing the connection of rhythm in our kiss.

  My skirt has ridden up my thighs but I don't care. No one can see aside from the waiter and if he knows his part, he'll be discreet and look the other way. Truan's solid palm slides up the back of my leg, across my ass cheek where he lingers before covering my back to bring me closer to him.

  I notice the vacancy shivering down my legs as his touch moves on. I want him back there, his hand on my thighs, pushing the fabric up higher. I squirm slightly on his massive legs and my pussy rubs against the hard muscle sending pink lights illuminating my skin.

  Another moan and his hands cup me, seeming to take over my entire length. One at the back of my head, holding me motionless as he buries his tongue in me, the other cupping my ass cheek. His small finger lying alongside my slit makes me squirm again, needing him to invade my pussy mouth.

  Ohmigod, can he feel how soaked my panties are? He must think I'm a little slut getting so wet for a guy kissing me. But this isn't any guy. Or any kiss. He makes me lose my mind, my juices, maybe even my heart.

  He palms the sides of my head to break the kiss. We're both panting for air, our breath mingling as he restrains my face an inch from his. Our lips are almost touching, still craning for connection.

  “Fuck,” Truan moans.

  I can tell he's trying to restrain himself. I can feel the heat of an enormous swelling in his pants burning into the side of my thigh. So close. Our kiss took us further than we imagined and we're both struggling with the shock. The yearning for him to throw me across the cafe table, stand over me as he opens his jeans to unleash the beast within, is unbearable.

  If only he'd torn my underwear to the side and pushed my thighs wide to shove into me all the way to the hilt, I'd have stretched open to take him. I want him. I've never wanted anyone like this.

  So it hurts.

  So it makes me want to tug my hair at the roots to alleviate the agony of hunger.

  “I want to hurt you,” he grits out.

  His hand again scrapes down the side of my neck but this time alights on the side of my breast. His thumb finds my nipple craning hard and pinches it with a tug so I whimper with delicious lust. He pulls out the engorged peak until I moan and beg for him.

  “Hurt me,” I whimper.

  Knowing when I open my legs and his cock thrusts into me, an exquisite moment of pain will ensue and bond us together.

  “I want to throw you down on this table and tear these gorgeous tits from their restraints. I want to suck these demanding little nipples until they mountain with lust. And then I want to suck your juices out of your pussy until you tug my head to bury my tongue in you hard enough to lick these demanding little bullets from inside.”

  “Is there not a set with a king size bed on this lot?” I moan, my hands clawing at his shoulders, his neck, the back of his head.

  “I don't need a bed. I could fuck you standing in a dark alley with my back against the wall.”

  A rash of goosebumps rises along my thighs from his gravel toned promise falling on my lips. But his waiter is close by and security make frequent patrols through the buildings on the lot. We'd both be bounced from the studio and instantly unemployed if he carried it out.

  “That cream looks fucking delicious right now,” he says, making me giggle as I imagine him smearing it across my horny little nipples and clit then lapping it up.

  He keeps me curled on his lap and lifts the cup to my mouth. His eyes stapled to my lips as I inhale the aromatic brew through the almost melted cream. He licks the remainder from my top lip and kisses it sweetly, right as the patrol passes through.

  “True, I've been paging you for the last half hour,” the guard stops at our table, taking in the coffee on the table and me nestled on Truan's knees.

  “Hey, Steve. Sorry Bud, I brought a girl to Paris for our first date.”

  “Cute, you know that's not allowed.”

  I try to climb off his lap but Truan keeps me pinned as though reluctant to let me leave his arms now he has me.

  “I know, but you can't blame me for wanting to treat this girl.”

  Steve gives me the once over but I can't tell whether he's impressed or otherwise. He seems agitated by something and anxious to speak to Truan, maybe without me there.

  “True, the police are here. They want to speak to you.”

  “What about?” Truan doesn't deflate with the shock those words normally produce.

  “I said I'd get you to call them, but they refuse to leave.”

  Truan's body stiffens beneath me, every limb turning rigid and not in a good way now.

  “What is it?” I whisper, giving his forearm a squeeze to let him know I'm on side.

  “The usual,” he grits out. “Knox fucking Templeton.”

  ChapterEleven

  The city of Paris starts trembling like a mini earthquake has hit. Voices echo on the other side of the set walls. The rumbling is caused by hands knocking across the wood, trying to locate a way in. The noises continue past along the scenery and I guess they found the small door because the only people I see running up the Montmartre hill Truan and I strolled along hand in hand, are LAPD detectives.

  I'm prompted to look around and locate the cameras as the scene unfolds. It's more like Un-Funniest Home Videos than a good movie though. And impossible to believe. Dread creeps through me.

  Truan powers up his thighs to raise us both from the cafe chair. Then he sets me down carefully on mine with a look of apology burrowing from his eyes and turns to face the cops.

  “You have the right to remain silent,” the surly men in shirtsleeves read him his list of rights while they snap handcuffs on his wrists.

  I notice how they make sure to jerk his powerful biceps taut behind him, so he has no leeway to move and break them apart. Or maybe they want to show him he's not such a big guy now. I can't stand to see Truan humbled like that.

  “Wait. Officers, please. He has a scene to shoot in less than ten hours,” I beg them, not only for Truan's sake but also for my boss. The movie will be put on hold at a cost of hundreds of thousands a day if Truan can't film the stunt.

  “That's too bad, Miss -?” The smaller of the two men turns his attention to me.

  I don't care for the intimidation tactics of trying to silence me with the unspoken threat that I will become a person of interest by association. Fuck that noise.

  “Jenna Golden. Personal assistant to Mr Knox Templeton, he's the -”

  “Yes, we are aware of Mr Templeton's identity,” the officer cuts me short. “We just came from his home in the hills.”

  “It's okay, Jenna,” Truan says. With a look that tells me to stay out of it.

  He's being so calm and it makes him appear even stronger and more masculine in my eyes, but I can't just walk away from this. I need to know what's going on. What were the police doing at Knox's house?

  “Does Knox know you're taking Mr Dexter? He'll need to be informed.”

  “Of course he knows. Knox Templeton is responsible for this douchebag while he's out on parole.”

  Responsible? Parole?

  “That's why you live in Knox's mansion?” I gasp. “He's your jailer?”

  “It's not like that, Jenna.”

  “That's enough out of you,” the big cop shouts in Truan's face. “We found the evidence that will send you down this time.”

  “What evidence? Of what?” I stutter, confounded by the revelation of Truan as a bad boy.

  “We're taking him in now,” the cop tells me. “Criminals don't get a furlough, not even to shoot Hollywood movies.”

  He's avoiding giving me any more information about the case. Before I can think of any other reason to detain them, they cup their fists around Truan's elbows and pull him back down the Parisian cobbled street toward the cut through. Truan manage
s to hold his head high and proud but I can tell he's dejected.

  Fuck.

  Paris will never seem the same to me again.

  As I watch them disappear, Francois, who was standing behind me taking in the scene with equal shock, clears the table, shaking his head all the while. He shuts up the pretend shop like any normal keeper and I'm left stunned. Not only this set but the entire world is one big facade. It's hard to tell what's real and what's phoney in every case.

  A shudder runs down me as I wander the street alone now, wondering whether I've been falling for a psychopathic criminal who truly did want to hurt me. Not in the way I was anticipating so eagerly.

  “I should just go home,” I say to no one in the deserted cityscape. “I'm not cut out for this life.”

  But this is life. Tough shit to get through.

  Running home to hide behind my parents' protection from bad people isn't what big girls do. (Well some do, my cousin Raylene came home to her mom's house at the age of thirty two when her boyfriend left her and she decided she didn’t want to pay bills or cook her own dinner). For me to go home because I've encountered a big bad wolf, or two, would make me as much of a quitter as my cousin.

  Maybe it isn't only Hollywood where people are fake and don't understand what's real. Back home there were plenty of people who faked out and made nice to get what they wanted or so others would like them. God, I knew so many girls like that. Guys too. And everyone in Comfort believes what they see on TV or pull up on a Google search. No one considers the truth these days.

  I'm still in shock over Truan being dragged away by the cops so abruptly. Just when he was about to take me somewhere and carry out the promises he made across the table. Trembles ripple up the inside of my skin just thinking about what he wanted to do to hurt me. I haven't been able to stop thinking about those women tied and spread to the cross thingy in that velvety dark room.

  Did he want to do that to me? Did he want to spank my wide open clit with a bat, or with the flat of his hand?